Relieve your memories with these sporting books

Written by Brandon King · Published Jan 9, 2018

We’ve put together a list of our favourite sport books to coincide with the launch of our new Sporting Memories groups. These new groups encourage over-50s to reminisce about sporting events they’ve enjoyed and enjoy quizzes, games and gentle activities.

“Cricket is a game rich in international history, sporting characters and, on occasions, controversy.

“Over his long career as a cricket commentator and journalist, Ralph Dellor has met some of the greatest exponents of the ‘summer’ game. In the 1990s he conducted a series of face-to-face taped interviews with famous cricketers past and present. Nine of these extraordinary interviews have now been captured in the written word.”

“The most comprehensive and definitive biography of Muhammad Ali that has ever been published, based on more than 500 interviews with those who knew him best, with many dramatic new discoveries about his life and career.”

Football

“What does it mean to be forever defined by one moment, unable to escape the hold it commands over you in other people’s eyes and in your own imagination?

“Fifty years on from England’s World Cup victory, football great Sir Bobby Charlton takes us back to the greatest moment of his life: what he saw, what he heard, how he felt as the lynchpin attacking midfielder in England’s winning team.”

“Football is a national passion that inspires nostalgia and friendships. Fields of dreams, theatres of football, whatever you wish to call them, football grounds are saturated with memories and hopes - and this new revamped, re-illustrated and completely revised edition brings some of these flooding back across the years.”

“To mark the 50th anniversary of his debut for Manchester United, Duncan Hamilton examines George Best’s crowded life and premature death.

“But most importantly, Hamilton presents Best at his glorious peak - the precocious goals, the labyrinthine runs, the poise and balletic balance and the body swerves. This is George Best - footballing immortal.”

“Thirteen very different Ipswich Town supporters write about their favourite game. From the sublime, when Ipswich beat Bolton in the 2000 play-off semi-finals to a near riot at Millwall in 1978, and including classic games against Norwich and Sheffield United, this book shows how it’s not our greatest victories as a football club that stay in our hearts, but other values, less tangible than silverware: love, family, friendship & sport.”

“Ipswich Town’s league championship success in 1961/62 was one of the greatest shocks in the history of professional football in England. This is the story of that season in a match-by-match account set against the background of the news stories of the day.”

“This volume is an Aladdin’s cave of memories and memorabilia, guaranteed to whisk you back to Portman Road’s fondly remembered ‘Golden Age’ of mud and magic - as well as a Blues-mad childhood of miniature tabletop games and imaginary, comic-fuelled worlds.

“The book recalls a more innocent era of football, lingering longingly over relics from the good old days - Tractor Boys stickers and petrol freebies, league ladders, big-match programmes and much more - revisiting lost football culture, treasures and pleasures that are 100% Ipswich Town. If you are a lifelong Ipswich fan, one of the army of obsessive soccer kids at any time from the arrival of Bobby Robson to the early days of the Premier League, then this is the book to recall the mavericks - Mariner, Muhren and Mills, Holland, Beattie and Butcher - the the marvels of the lost world of football.”

“This book looks back on the 1978 FA Cup campaign that culminated in Bobby Robson’s team defeating Arsenal 1-0 to become FA Cup winners. All the details of Ipswich’s road to Wembley are featured in this book, including a round-by-round review and full, detailed biographies of every player to have taken part in the campaign.”

“This title features hundreds of photographs of Ipswich Town in action during the 1960s. It spans the era from Alf Ramsey’s League Championship triumph in 1961/62 to the beginning of the Bobby Robson years in 1969.”

“This is the autobiography of one of British speedway’s all-time greats - a motorcycling legend of Ipswich, where he has been one of the town’s most successful and finest sporting ambassadors for the best part of half a century.”